How would you amend clay?
tete_a_tete
8 years ago
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Carrot Beds - How to Amend Clay Soil
Comments (8)I had heavy clay in one bed and found out from the folks on the Soil, Compost & Mulch forum to never use sand to loosen clay soil. Even though it seems logical to add sand, it actually will turn your soil to something like cement. Add some nice loose compost and keep working on it. Last year that bed had such heavy clay that I turned it into a lasagna bed and got a HUGE yeild of squashes. We had great luck with doing what marlingardener suggested. My carrot bed was poor rocky soil so I sifted it and made a raised bed with lots of compost. We planted the carrots using Dick Raymonds wide rows method of planting and got a really good yield of Danvers half long. Check out the other forum for great tips on improving your soil. Good Luck....See MoreTo amend or not to amend? Clay soil...
Comments (22)"It seems that it is highly recommended to plant peach trees in raised beds from the experience on this board. Does anyone have a good link or more detailed directions as far as how to do that? What type of soil do I need? How deep do I dig the hole? How high should the bed be?" For my peach trees I use mounds and terraces. It doesn't seem to make a difference how tall the mound is. Some of my mounds are 1' tall, others started out 4' tall (before settling). The peach trees do about the same either way. Some people enclose their raised beds with a raised border of some kind. I think that's fine too. I don't think it makes much difference what soil you use for the raised beds/mounds. Several years ago, I installed drain tiles in the orchard area (The drainage was horrid and I was tired of losing peach trees.) In places we had to excavate to a depth of 4' to install the tile. What we dug out was pure clay. I used this material for some of the mounds. The peach trees have done fine in the clay mounds. Per the above posts, I would only use mounds if the drainage is poor. But since you mention puddling, I strongly suspect you could benefit from raised beds/mounds. Mounds not only provide good drainage, they also loosen the dirt so there is minimal resistance for the roots to spread. Mulching on top keeps the soil moist longer into the growing season, further encouraging root growth. It's hard for peaches not to succeed when they have moist (but not overly wet) loose soil with no weed competition and plenty of sunshine. Here's a picture that's a couple years old. You can see some tall and shorter mounds. Some of the older trees aren't in mounds. The drainage tile helped them. Here's a pic of some terraces I built last fall for planting peaches this spring. By the way, I don't bother with mounds for more water tolerant trees like apple, pear and plum, unless the drainage is really bad....See MoreSoil amendments: clay soil, fully planted beds
Comments (16)My first garden was created 5 years ago...we took off the sod, amended with compost, tilled and planted and mulched. It was a nightmare. I probably needed 60 times more compost, and never could have afforded it. The following two years I hated working in the garden because it was such hard work with the clay and many plants didn't thrive. I replanted areas many times and each time I would add more compost/mulch, whatever I could get my hands on. I also added a soil conditioner that was very expensive but works like gypsum...breaks down clay. (Who knows, maybe it WAS gypsum with a bigger price tag.) It's 6 years later now and I have to tell you that the garden is just a delight to work in now. I plan to spread gypsum a couple of times each year and continue mulching the beds, but I'm sure I'll never have to do all that double-digging like I did before....just keep on piling on the stuff like everyone wrote above, and before you know it, your beds will be as you need them to be. I also highly recommend that you search out plants that LIKE clay, so that your plantings will be successful. I spent many, many dollars buying plants that needed more drainage than I had and would die...and I wondered why. Some of those plants might do ok for me now in the same garden, but I think it's important to plant things that actually LIKE the ground that they are in today. Good Luck!...See MoreWhy You Should Not Amend Clay Soil
Comments (12)It is perhaps easiest to explain if you consider the entire planting hole as the PWT, which in essence it is. Drainage in clay soil can be so slow that any moisture retentive soil (potting soil, compost, garden planting mix. etc.) used to fill the planting hole will simply become overly saturated and remain that way indefinitely....or as long as it takes the clay to drain completely. With some plants, even a few hours under these conditions will lead to root rot. Do some research on soil texture interface. It will explain how using soils of two different textures - in this case clay and whatever enriched potting soil you choose - will affect how water percolates through the soil profile. And the roots of many plants will fail to to make the transition from a loose and overly rich planting hole into the native soil and will just circle around the enriched soil area. Or be very slow in their transition into the native soil. That is why it is strongly recommended NOT to amend individual plantings holes but to plant directly into the indigenous or native soil only. Unless you amend over a very large area, as Kaillean suggested....See Moretete_a_tete
8 years agoRon Duggan
8 years agonancyjane_gardener
8 years agoviper114
8 years agokimmq
8 years agotoxcrusadr
8 years agoled_zep_rules
8 years ago
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